Ruminations on a Prosthetic
by icbiwf
Summary: What if it wasn't his leg that Peeta lost in the Games? A submission for Prompts in Panem's Visual Prompts week, Day 7. Prompted by the cover image and the quote: "I like work: it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours." -Jerome K. Jerome (1859 - 1927)


_PiP Day 7 was a prompt based on a randomly-generated image and quote. When I first opened the image and quote generators the day the prompts were released, the very first image and quote that I got was the image above (larger version: farm9 dot staticflickr dot com slash 8391 slash 8570766183_2af8260298_b dot jpg ) and the following quote:_

_"I like work: it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours."_  
_Jerome K. Jerome (1859 - 1927)_

_This is what my mind turned them into._

…..

"You're doing it again."

Katniss flinches, startled out of her reverie, and looks up at me from where she sits next to me on the bed. She hates when I catch her staring at it. She blushes, like she always does, and sheepishly mutters, "Sorry," like she always does.

I put down my sketchbook and turn to her, dropping my leg to make sure to give her a good view. "It's not like it's any different than it was the last time you studied it. It doesn't change."

"I know," she says. "It's just… It fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours."

I smirk slightly. "You do."

"Shut up!" she exclaims, slapping me hard in the arm. "It's not like you mind. You certainly didn't mind last night!"

I do my best to grin at her, but I think she can tell it's half-hearted. "I'm just glad that I finally have an effect on you, even if this is what it took to catch your interest."

She shifts closer to me so she can wrap one arm around my neck and rest her chin on my shoulder. "You know that's not the only thing that caught my interest, right?"

I give her a small smile. I lean in and press our lips together. Above all, I try to believe her.

…..

I'll always remember that night. The last night of the Games. My last night as a whole man, I think in my darker moments. Katniss and I were fleeing toward the Cornucopia, being chased by a pack of wolf-mutts. Cato from Two had already preceded us up there, we'd still have to deal with him once we escaped the mutts.

We were right at the base of the Cornucopia when I could feel that the mutts were too close. I turned to find one mere yards away. I knew there was no time to climb before it would be upon us. I herded Katniss behind me and spread my arms and legs out wide to protect her as much as possible.

I guess I just made too tempting a target in that stance. The mutt pounced right in front of me and savagely chomped down on my crotch.

The pain was incredible. It made my earlier encounter with Cato's sword and a swarm of tracker jackers seem like a pleasant diversion. I'm pretty sure I passed out for a minute, or was just incoherent in agony. When I came to, the mutts were gone and Cato was lying dead in front of the Cornucopia, an arrow sticking out of his eye.

Katniss was yelling at the sky, fearsome and beautiful as she berated the Gamemakers. "You promised! You said we could both win! You can't take it back _now!_"

It didn't take a genius to figure out what must have happened. Katniss saved us from the rest of the mutts by killing Cato and ending the Games, but then they changed the rule back, to try to get us to kill each other. We should have seen it coming, really, and maybe we would have if we weren't half starved and were anywhere near in our right minds.

As much as I wanted to tell Katniss of my love and beg her to go home and live a good life, in the moment all I could do was desperately beg for an end to the agony, to die by some other method than slowly bleeding to death from the ragged remnants of my privates. "Nightlock," I croaked, knowing that Katniss had kept some of the berries after the death of the girl from Five. At her questioning look, I struggled to steady my voice. "Nightlock," I repeated.

Understanding bloomed on Katniss's face. "Yes, Peeta…" She retrieved the berries, but only dispensed half into my outstretched palm, taking the other half in her own. "Together," she told me gravely, staring intently into my eyes. I nodded, or as close as I could manage at the time, and raised the berries to my lips with my shaking hand. Katniss reached out and clasped our free hands together. "On the count of three," she said. I tried to nod again, knowing I couldn't respond verbally but fully prepared to die alongside my love. But by the time she got to three, we were interrupted by Claudius Templesmith announcing us both as winners. After a moment's elation, Katniss took her first good look at my wound, and nearly fainted.

I never saw the hovercraft that retrieved us. I passed out from the agony of Katniss trying to staunch the flow of blood from my wound, spent my entire hospital stay unconscious, and by the time I woke up I was already being prepped for the Games recap with Caesar Flickerman. It was left to Portia to explain what had happened to me. What had been repaired, and what had had to be replaced. Bacchus and Delilah assured me that it looked quite nice as they applied finishing touches to my makeup and hair, but I didn't exactly trust their aesthetic judgment. I didn't take a look at my new equipment until that night in my room, after the interview. I avoided it for as long as I could, but eventually it was either face up to my new reality or wet the bed. I went into the uncomfortably well-lit bathroom, dropped my pants, and there it was.

…..

Prosthedick. That's what Katniss calls it. The silvery-gray, sort of plasticky, sort of metally appendage that replaced the penis I lost to the mutt. It took some getting used to, though not as much as you'd think. The strangest thing about it is that, as out of place as it looks hanging between my legs, it works almost completely normally. I don't like thinking about how intricately it must be tied into my bodily systems in order to work the way it does. To me it looks like a section of industrial hose or tubing grafted onto my skin. Seeing my urine flowing out of this thing, or my cum spurting from its tip, is still weird for me sometimes. Does my blood actually fill it to make it hard, or does it harden on its own somehow, monitoring my state of arousal via some kind of link to my brain? These are the kinds of thoughts that bother me sometimes.

It surprised me, the first time it got hard. I didn't know it did that, though it makes sense in retrospect. It stiffens and softens just like a normal dick, but doesn't grow or shrink. This leaves me with a prominent bulge in my pants all the time, even when I'm completely relaxed. There are worse problems to have, I suppose. Once, when I was 14 and my brother Rye decided it was up to him to educate me about sex, he had informed me that Mellark men were "growers, not showers." Well, not anymore. Not for me, anyway. What you see is what you get with the prosthedick.

Don't ask me how this thing can _feel_, how stroking this piece of equipment can give me sexual pleasure. I'm not sure I want to know how it happens, but it does. It still feels strange to me when I stoke myself and feel this assemblage in my hand instead of the dick I'm used to, but from the other side, the feeling of my hand running up and down my shaft is almost the same as it ever was. And Katniss certainly doesn't mind the way my new dick feels, not in her hand or in her mouth or in her cunt. Unfortunately I don't have a before-and-after comparison for those activities, so I don't know if they feel different now.

That's another thought that plagues me sometimes: I'll never regret that Katniss is the first and only woman I've had sex with, and I would never trade the relationship we now share. But sometimes I wish I could have fucked her with my real dick, just once.

She hates when I call it that. My real dick. As opposed to my fake dick. She says that every part of me is real, that every part of me is me. I try to believe her. In return, I hate when she blames herself for my needing a new dick. I would have given my life to protect her form those mutts; my dick was a small price to pay by comparison. Not that _it_ was small. No, I was speaking metaphorically. I wasn't small. Not at all. I mean, I'm not bragging or anything. It wasn't as big as this thing the Capitol put on me, but it was a good size. It was fine.

Why am I getting defensive over the size of the dick that I lost? It's not like anyone other than me ever saw the thing, let alone did anything with it. What, am I going to take pride in how large a meal it made for the mutt who ate it?

Very filling, I'm sure. Enough so that it didn't eat any more of my body parts, at least.

…..

Katniss tried to come to my room with me that night after the Games recap and the victory ball, but Haymitch kept us apart and sent her to her own room, giving me at least the one night on my own to come to terms with my new situation.

The next day when we sat down for our final interview with Caesar Flickernam, I could tell Katniss was distracted by the huge bulge in my pants. Seriously, it looks like I have a shirt balled up in there, but somehow in all the excitement it had escaped her notice the night before during the recap. I don't know what she thought at first – maybe it could have been a bandage? – but in the middle of the interview when Caesar asked how my "new equipment" was working out, it didn't take Katniss long to put two and two together.

"New equipment?" she had asked, her eyes scanning me and quickly settling on the bulge. "Oh, no…"

"No one told you?" Caesar asked, as if the entire exchange hadn't been orchestrated to get that reaction out of her.

"I haven't had the chance," I explained with a slight shrug, just to get him to shut up.

"It's my fault," she said. "You were protecting me."

"That's what I was always planning, was to protect you," I said. "But shooting Cato to end the Games before that mutt could finish me off, that was quick thinking. You saved my life."

"We saved each other," she insisted, tightening her grip on my hand. I chose not to argue.

"Well," Caesar said, interrupting our moment, "the doctors tell me that you should have nothing to worry about, Katniss. After all of Panem fell in love with you two, they didn't dare leave the Star-Crossed Lovers of District 12 anything less than _fully functional_."

My face reddened in embarrassment at his insinuation. It took Katniss a moment to catch up, but she soon matched my blush with her own, and spent the next several minutes with her face buried in my shirt.

…..

The Victory Tour is coming up fast, only a month away now. We had another meeting with Haymitch about it today. For a few months we had been able to relax and put our trouble with the Capitol out of out minds, but that time is over now. We have to concentrate on putting on the best possible show of being in love while on the tour. I need to hide all of my issues related to the prosthedick, and Katniss needs to completely change her personality to look like what the vapid Capitol people expect a woman in love to look like. If we fail, not only are we in danger of retaliations by President Snow, but our families will undoubtedly suffer as well, possibly even the entire district.

I can't express how stressful this whole thing is, for all of us. And it's only getting worse as the tour draws closer. Haymitch deals with it all by getting even drunker than usual, which I wouldn't have thought possible until he started doing it. Katniss and I don't want to go down that road, but luckily we've found something else to distract ourselves from all the stress.

"Oh, fuck! Peeta! Yes! Yes! Right there, Peeta! Fuck!"

Katniss is laying face-down under me as I slam into her from behind. This is one of her favorite positions. She always comes hard and often when we fuck like this.

I normally prefer to be face to face with Katniss when we make love. That's what it is when we do it that way, making love. I want to be able to kiss her face and neck and breasts, to nibble her ear and her nipples and the pulse point on her neck, to see the reaction on her beautiful face as I touch and pinch and caress all over her body. To look her in the eye as we fall apart together. That's not what she prefers, though.

She doesn't say it in so many words, but she likes positions that let her take me as deeply as possible. That let her ignore everything else and just concentrate on me penetrating her. She wants to feel every inch of me. Well, of this Capitol contraption between my legs. I have mixed feelings, because it's not actually _me_ she's feeling, it's the prosthedick. Katniss says she doesn't care, it's all just me. I try to believe her. And everything feels normal to me, this thing might as well be my own flesh when my eyes are closed. In fact, sometimes when we're together I actually forget for a moment. In my mind's eye I see myself as I was. I see myself, whole and unaugmented, pounding into Katniss Everdeen, exactly as I spent years dreaming about. And then I look away from Katniss's luscious body writhing beneath mine to the spot where we're joined, and find that thing pumping in and out of her instead.

But she likes it like this. And she's Katniss, I'll do anything for her. So I close my eyes and bury my face in her beautiful hair and channel my fears and frustrations into slamming into her even harder. I reach one hand around to massage her clit while my other hand finds a breast and tweaks a nipple. I kiss and suck along her shoulder blades and leave a trail of love bites across her back where no one but the two of us will ever see them, as if I'm marking my territory to allay my own insecurities. And when she screams my name and clenches around me my own release quickly follows.

…..

It was the night we spent on the train home when our relationship began to take the form it would have once we got home. The train had made a refueling stop after dinner, and Katniss had taken the opportunity to walk outside and get some fresh air. I wanted to join her, but I was still a bit sore, and hadn't quite gotten used to walking around with this giant elephant cock hanging off of me, so I stayed inside on the couch we had claimed in the lounge car. Katniss had been acting a bit strangely ever since we had boarded the train after our interview, and it was beginning to worry me. All of my old insecurities - that I wasn't good enough to attract her attention, that she would never return my feelings for her, that she was already committed to Gale Hawthorne - were beginning to get the better of me. I wanted to be able to discuss it all with her, but I didn't want to do it in front of Effie or Haymitch. Honestly, I wasn't sure which one would be worse, Effie with her inexhaustible enthusiasm and complete lack of self-awareness or Haymitch with his… Haymitch-ness. I didn't know when we'd get the chance to be alone together to talk.

As if they were reading my mind, just a minute after Katniss had left the train, Haymitch followed her out, and I only had a moment to wonder what he wanted to talk to her about before Effie set herself in the couch opposite mine and proceeded to prattle on about things that were apparently very important to her: How pleased I must be to bring some small bit of happiness to my dismal district. How my living situation won't be nearly so horrible now. How at least I grew up in town, honestly she didn't understand how Katniss and those poor cretins in the Seam could stand it. How the houses in the Victor's Village are so nice they almost feel like civilization! How replacing my junk was a wonderful place to begin what she was sure would be a lifetime of remakes. How I should really consider shaving half my head and dying the rest purple as a logical next step. How sex organ replacement would most likely be the hot new trend in Capitol fashion this fall. How she herself was thinking of having work done on her genitals.

I just nodded from time to time, making noises of agreement whenever she paused for air, and tried not to vomit. After what felt like hours but was surely less, I felt a hand on my shoulder, and looked up to find Katniss returned from her walk. I swear I was happier to see her in that moment than I was when she found me buried by the river in the arena. "Sorry to interrupt, Effie," she said, "but we're both pretty tired. I think we're going to call it a night."

I gave Effie my best apologetic smile as we left, trying not to let the discomfort in my groin show on my face. I followed wordlessly when Katniss pulled me into her bedroom with her, sitting next to her on the bed and silently waiting for her to say whatever she had brought me in there to say.

As the silence dragged on, I could see Katniss getting more and more nervous. She kept her gaze down in her lap and kept flitting quick looks up to my face, and wringing her hands and chewing on her lower lip, and she looked so fucking cute that it took everything in me not to grab her in a bear hug and kiss her until we both ran out of air. But we did have to have this talk, and she must have realized it too or else she wouldn't have pulled me into her room, so I restrained myself.

Finally I reached out and took Katniss's hands in my own to still them. She looked up to me in surprise. "Katniss, it's just me," I said. "You don't have to be nervous."

For just a moment she had a look of pure panic on her face. Then she blurted out, "I'm so sorry, Peeta!"

She didn't say anything after that, and it was my turn to panic. What was she sorry for? I'm sorry I don't want to see you anymore when we get home? I'm sorry I'm really engaged to Gale? I'm sorry I lied to you about how I feel?

I thought my tongue had frozen and speech would be impossible, so I surprised myself when I asked in a steady voice, "What are you sorry for, Katniss?"

"It's my fault you were hurt," she says. "It's all my fault. Everything from your leg to your… It was all because of me."

"Katniss," I say, "that's not true. It's not. You didn't cause any of this. You saved me."

"You got hurt protecting me. Both times, you were hurt protecting me."

I shake my head. "What do you think, if I wasn't protecting you then Cato and the mutts would have left me alone?" I ask. "Katniss, I never stood a chance in the Games, I knew that going in. But here I am, and I'm here because of you. When Cato stabbed me, when that mutt bit me, you were the one who saved me. You dug me out of that riverbank, you nursed me back to health, you went to the feast for my medicine, you ended the Games before I bled to death. I couldn't have survived without you, Katniss."

She sighed. She looked a little defeated. "Okay. But I'm still sorry."

I decided to take what I could get. "Okay. But you don't have to be."

We sat in silence for a while after that. Katniss leaned against me, not unlike our position during our final interviews with Caesar, and we watched out the window as the world slipped by and the sun slipped behind the horizon.

Finally, Katniss asked, "So, um… What's it like?"

I was confused. "What's what like?"

I looked down to see Katniss blushing deep red. She stammered out, "Your, um, your new… equipment."

My jaw fell open. Was _Katniss Everdeen_ asking me to tell her about my cock? Even when the cock in question was brand new to me and a wonder of Capitol technology, the very idea of _Katniss_ asking me about _my cock_ was way too close to certain fantasies I'd harbored since I was twelve. I had to blink several times to make sure what I was seeing and hearing was real.

My silence dragged on a little too long for Katniss's comfort. She dropped her gaze back to her lap. "Um, you don't have to tell me, if you don't want to. I mean, I know that's private and-"

"It's not that," I cut her off. "I was just surprised, is all. After you were so careful to avoid seeing anything when you were washing me, the question just caught me off guard."

My words seemed to calm her somewhat, she looked back up at me with an expectant look. It took me a moment to understand that look; I still hadn't answered her question. "Well, um, it's… I don't know. It's hard to describe. It's… different." I almost laughed at myself, at how spectacularly I was failing at describing it, and Katniss's uncomprehending look didn't surprise me at all. "I don't know how to describe it. It's just, not what I'm used to."

There was a heavy silence. Katniss seemed to be carefully considering my words, though I wasn't sure I had actually made enough sense for there to be anything to consider. If I thought her earlier question had surprised me, though, it was nothing compared to what she said next.

"Can I see it?"

I gaped at her. This was _Katniss_. This was the girl who two weeks ago wouldn't even look at me when I was dying. And now she was asking to see.

If nothing else, this thing at least aroused her curiosity.

"Are you sure?" I asked, because I still wasn't one hundred percent sure this was all really happening. But when she timidly nodded her head, I let out a deep breath I hadn't realized I was holding, and began undoing my pants.

I sat on the bed, completely exposed to her, my pants around my knees and my shirt pulled up over my stomach. Katniss, for her part, just stared at me. At _it_. The way her eyes widened, the way her pupils dilated, the way she shyly bit her lower lip as she studied me, it was killing me. Everything she did was sexy as hell, and she had no idea about the effect she was having on me.

In that moment I wanted nothing more than to pin her to the bed and ravish her, but it was Katniss's small gasp of surprise that alerted me to the fact that my new cock had begun responding to my desires. "It's hard…" I said in surprise before I could think about it. I had only had this thing for a day, I didn't have a lot of experience with it, and to be honest it had never occurred to me if it got hard or not.

"It's huge," Katniss said, her voice slightly choked. She was right, it was bigger than I used to be.

"I guess it makes sense," I said, trying to lighten the mood. "Caesar said it was 'fully functional.'"

Katniss didn't say anything, only nodded slightly. Her face was flushed, as I'm sure mine was. I was afraid this whole thing was making her nervous, that she was going to bolt from the room at any moment. But then she slowly reached her arm out and wrapped her hand around my cock.

I groaned so loud it startled us both. Katniss jerked her hand back a bit in reflex, before taking hold of me once more. In that moment, nothing else mattered. I didn't care that some mutt had eaten my dick, I didn't care that I had some Capitol appliance attached to my body, I didn't care how sore I was, I didn't care about the niggling suspicion in the back of my mind that Katniss was more curious about my fake dick than she was genuinely interested in a relationship with me. In that moment the only thing that mattered in my world was that _Katniss Everdeen had her hand on my hard cock_.

I almost came right then and there.

Then she began moving her hand, sliding it up and down the surprisingly slippery materiel that made up the surface of my new dick. "Is this okay?" she asked nervously.

If she was nervous, there weren't words to describe how I was feeling. "C-Can you grip it harder?"

She tightened her grip, and began pumping me a bit faster. "Fuck, Katniss…" I groaned as my eyes rolled back and closed of their own volition. I forced them back open, so I could see Katniss's small hand holding my dick. But after a moment, I let them close again as I threw my head back; the sight wasn't as erotic as I had thought it would be, not with my new machine cock.

I didn't last long. Even given all the other circumstances, I was still a teenage guy, and it was my first sexual experience involving another person, and it was the girl I'd been dreaming about since before I knew what to dream about. I came hard, all over my stomach and Katniss's hand. It wasn't until later that I could think clearly enough to be surprised that I still came normally.

Katniss seemed fascinated by my spunk; she kept playing with it between her fingers, sometimes smearing it on my stomach. I just watched her, enraptured. Eventually I took off my shirt and used it to clean myself up, then I took her hand and did the same.

She looked up at me, suddenly looking nervous again. "Was that okay?"

I almost laughed at her question, but stopped myself because I was sure she would misinterpret it, but I couldn't wipe the huge smile from my face. "Katniss, that was incredible. Can I, um, can I return the favor?"

Her eyes widened at my suggestion, and I knew I had pushed her too far. But she surprised me again with her answer. "Not tonight. I don't think I'm ready for that yet."

"Okay," I said, and reiterated myself from earlier. "You know you don't have to be nervous, right? It's just me, Katniss."

The smile returned to her face. "I know," she said quietly. She got up and walked over to the dresser and pulled out some clothes. "I'm going to go change."

I took that as my cue. "Okay," I said, moving to stand and pull up my pants. "I guess I'll see you tomorrow."

"No!" she yelled, running back over to me and grabbing my hands, making me drop my pants again. When she realized what she had done, she let go and took a small step back. "Can you stay tonight?"

I responded the only way I could. "Of course."

She flashed me a smile, and went into the bathroom to change. For my part, I put my underwear back on finished taking my pants off, and sat back on the bed.

A few minutes later Katniss emerged wearing a nightgown. At first we laid stiffly next to each other, but then Katniss rolled over and curled herself around me, tucking her head just under my chin. I wrapped my arms around her and held her close, and felt all the tension drain out of the room as we relaxed into our positions. This was the same position we took when we shared a sleeping bag in the cave. This was the position I wanted to be in every night.

"I like listening to your heartbeat," she said quietly, her voice the only disturbance in the darkened room. "It comforts me."

"I like holding you like this," I told her. "As long as I can feel you, I know you're safe."

It wasn't until the next morning that I remembered my question from the previous afternoon. I stopped her before we went to breakfast. "Katniss can I ask you something?"

She nodded. "Sure."

"What did Haymitch want to talk to you about?"

She seemed confused by my question. "Haymitch?"

"Yeah. Yesterday, when he chased you outside at the fuel depot. What did he want?"

Her eyes widened when she realized what I was talking about, and then a look of guilt crossed her face. Before I could say anything, she blurted out, "It's the Capitol. They didn't like our stunt with the berries."

That didn't make sense to me. I thought the Capitol loved us. "What? What are you talking about?"

"It seemed too rebellious," she explained. "So, Haymitch has been coaching me through the last few days. So I didn't make it worse."

My mind was struggling to catch up to what I had just heard. I thought I was finally together with the love of my life, but now she was saying that the last few days, all those acts of love, she was being coached? By _Haymitch?_ "Coaching you?" And then I realized something else. "But not me."

Katniss looked all around the room, everywhere but at me. "He knew you were smart enough to get it right," she said, but I could hear the evasion in her voice.

"I didn't know there was anything to get right," I said accusingly.

Katniss sighed. "You know me, Peeta. I'm no good at saying something. I have the charm of a dead slug, remember? You think if I acted like myself anyone would believe we were in love?"

"So, what you're saying is, these last few days - and then, I guess, back in the arena - that was just some strategy you two worked out."

Katniss scowled at me. "No, Peeta, it was a strategy _you two_ worked out. Remember, you two came up with the starcrossed lovers, and sandbagged me with it at the interview. Because you knew I couldn't pretend."

I felt like my entire world was falling apart. I had the perfect life lined up for me, plenty of money, a huge house, a life of luxury, the girl of my dreams, and it was all falling apart. Because none of it meant anything without the girl. "So you've been pretending this whole time?" I choked out. "None of it was real?"

"Not all of it," she admitted, but didn't elaborate.

"Then how much?" I snapped. "No, forget that. I guess the real question is, how much of what we did last night was an act for the Capitol?"

"Peeta!" She actually looked surprised by the question, almost making me regret asking it. "I didn't- I wouldn't-" She stopped herself, and swallowed several times before looking me in the eye once more. "Peeta, I was only acting when we were on camera, when we were being watched. I wouldn't lie to you when we're alone."

A look of alarm crossed her face then, as if she had said something she wasn't planning on. Or maybe as if she had said something she hadn't realized was true.

I decided to try to believe her.

…..

Dinner is incredibly awkward. It always is when we eat with my family, which we do at least once every couple of weeks. We eat with her family much more often, but they live just down the street, and are much nicer to be around. I always offer to come here by myself, but Katniss doesn't trust them to be alone with me. Well, one of them in particular.

The meal goes as it usually does. My mother serves the food; my father probably cooked most of it, but my mother wants to take credit for being a proper wife and cooking for her family, so once the meal begins she does the serving. She makes a few barbed comments about how the meal is the best they could manage under the circumstances, and how it would be so much nicer if I were more generous with my Victor's stipend, even though she already spends more of it than I do.

A sharp glare from Katniss shuts her up.

My father and I try to make conversation, but it's forced at best. Katniss answers any questions put to her, but she isn't one for idle chit chat even in the best of circumstances. Barlee, who was always Mother's favorite, stays quiet, as if he's offended on her behalf for how Katniss treats her now. Rye, normally brash and sarcastic, is nervous and subdued. He'll make any crude or nasty comment to anyone at any time, but after what happened the day we got back from the Games, he's afraid of saying the wrong thing to Katniss, and even a little afraid of me. Every so often Mother will join Dad and I in the attempt at conversation, but she can't help but drift back to her usual biting jabs, earning another silencing glare from Katniss.

So we eat most of our meal in awkward silence. Even dessert doesn't spark discussion, and that's really saying something in a family of bakers. Katniss and I are still silent as we walk back home at the end of the night.

We're about half way back to the Victor's Village when she speaks up. "I'm not sorry."

I give her a questioning look. "I know everything is awkward in your family now, and I know it's because of what I did. But I'm not sorry. Those people treated you like shit, and I include your father in that because he let the other three run roughshod over you. They deserved what happened."

I don't want to argue with her, because despite my desire to defend my family I know she's right, but I have to speak up for Dad. "My father is a good guy."

"Not good enough," Katniss mutters. "He never stood up for you. He still doesn't."

I don't respond, because again, she's right. After another couple of minutes, though, I do say something. "I would never ask you to apologize."

"Huh?"

"For what you did that day," I explain. "I'm sorry my family is the way it is now, but I don't regret what happened."

Katniss appears to consider this for a moment, then she nods at me. "Good."

After a few more steps, she leans further into me, and bumps me playfully with her shoulder. I bump her back. A few times.

By the time we get home we're in a good mood again.

…..

I didn't have the monopoly on parental issues, at least. Those problems started right at the train station. Right after we were reunited with our families on the platform, a reporter yelled out to Mrs. Everdeen, "So what do you think of your daughter's new boyfriend?"

Mrs. Everdeen turned to the reporter with an expression that I wouldn't have recognized as a slight smile if I hadn't become used to seeing the exact same expression on Katniss's face. "Well, while Peeta is the very model of what a young man should be, I'm afraid that my daughter isn't old enough to have any boyfriend at all." She then punctuated the remark with a pointed look directly at me.

The whole exchange drew plenty of laughs and jeers from the gathered reporters. Someone tried to ask her what she thought of our time in the cave, but they were drowned out. One woman very clearly said, "Someone's in trouble!" with such excitement that you'd think she had just won a free remake.

I tried to let go of Katniss's hand and step away, to show at least some respect for her mother's wishes, but Katniss wouldn't let go, tightening her grip even as I tried to loosen mine. I turned to her with a questioning look, and she stared back at me determinedly. The message was clear enough: _Fuck what my mother says._ Fair enough, I planned on giving her the same message about my mother anyway.

It turned out she had that message pretty well down already. Once we were away from the train station and walking to our new houses in the Victor's Village, most of the reporters and camera operators went ahead of us so they could get set up outside our houses, and the few that remained were far enough away that we could hold a private conversation if we kept our voice down. This is when my mother decided to start in on me.

"Well, I hope you're pleased with yourself. Embarrassing me and ruining our family's reputation. And for what? For _her_? For a worthless whore form the Seam? Why couldn't you have just died like a man!" Then her whole face brightened, but she didn't lose the evil gleam in her eye. "Oh, I forgot, you're not a man anymore, are you? Not that you were ever much of one. But now you've literally lost your manhood, to go along with the figurative manhood you never had in the first place, despite my best efforts to-"

She was cut off at that point, as Katniss had finally let go of my hand, only to wheel around and punch my mother square in the throat. The choked sound she made as she collapsed in the dirt of the road, sending up little billowing clouds of the ever-present coal dust as she landed, would have been funny under other circumstances. Dad and my brothers turned at the commotion and looked like they were going to intervene, but I stepped between the three of them and Katniss and gave them a look that stopped them in their tracks.

They looked surprised as they did so, surprised to be so affected by a mere look from me. I was the baby of the family, after all. I was scared shitless of my own mother, I always caught the worst of any roughhousing between brothers, I didn't even like wrestling all that much and had let Rye beat me in the one big tournament I had participated in. But the look I gave them was not the look of a baby brother, or the look of a beaten-down abuse victim. The look I gave them was the look of a Hunger Games victor, a look that said _I've seen and done things that you could not possibly imagine. I have witnessed, and perpetrated, horrors you could never hope to comprehend. Do. Not. Fuck. With. __**ME**__._ And however shocked they were to be receiving that look from the beaten-down baby brother, none of them dared take another step.

Katniss, for her part, had knelt next to where my mother was sprawled on the ground, grabbed a fistful of her hair, and wrenched her head around to face her. She was giving my mother much the same look I had just given my father and brothers, but she punctuated her warning with words. "Do not _ever_ talk about Peeta that way again. Do not talk down to him, do not insult him, do not belittle him, and above all else don't you _dare_ touch him ever again, or else you'll wind up just like Cato, and just as quick. Do you understand me?"

My mother managed a shaky nod, and Katniss dropped her head back into the dirt. She walked back over to me, retook my hand, and continued on towards Victor's Village as if nothing untoward had happened, giving me no choice but to follow. We ignored the questions from the reporters and the shrieking of Effie Trinket.

As we walked on, as I thought of what had just happened, I found I couldn't wipe a smile off of my face. No one had ever stood up to my mother for me, not my father and not my brothers and truly not even me. But it had taken Katniss about thirty seconds before she couldn't restrain herself anymore.

"What are you smiling at?" Katniss asked when she saw.

"You." Katniss gave me a questioning look. "You're still protecting me."

She seemed to think for a moment. "Well, that's what you and I do, isn't it? We protect each other."

I smiled and nodded at her. She smiled back at me. And just because I couldn't stand not doing it, I pulled her into a tight embrace, turning my head slightly so I could whisper directly into her ear. "I really want to kiss you right now, but I don't want to give these cameras too good a show."

She laughed lightly. "I think they already had more than enough show." Whether she was referring to our exaggerated displays at the station or her fight with my mother, I wasn't sure. "But you're right. Let's save that for when we're alone."

We continued our walk in a comfortable silence. After several minutes, Katniss said, "You know she's full of shit, right? There's nothing wrong with you."

I tried to believe her.

…..

We're laying on the floor in the television room, the sweat on our bodies slowly drying. On Haymitch's advice, we had been watching some Capitol television, to see what they were saying about us and the upcoming Victory Tour.

It turns out Effie was right, genital replacement is the hot new trend in remakes. I wonder what Effie has gotten done to hers.

We could only take so much of that before we needed to distract ourselves, and we had resorted to our tried and true method of forgetting. Afterwards, it takes me several minutes to catch my breath. We went at it particularly vigorously tonight; I'm sure we'll both have bruises tomorrow. And rugburns. And maybe a sprained knee. But it's a mild sprain.

I roll onto my side so I can look over to Katniss. She's still laying flat on her back, her chest rising and falling with each great breath she heaves. The sight makes me start to harden again.

After a few more minutes, she raises her head up, and swipes her sweat-dampened hair out of her face. "Fuck, Peeta. I love your- um, you. I love you."

She looks nervous about her slip-up, but I just smile at her. I know what she had almost said. _I love your cock._ Any other man would be thrilled to hear that. Another man, who still had his real cock and not a Capitol construct. Another man, who was thrilled beyond measure that he had won the affections of his lifelong love instead of worrying about exactly _how_ and _why_ he had done so. Another man, who could simply enjoy kissing and holding and stroking and fucking his dream girl without making himself sick over whether she had chosen him for the right reasons. Another man, who when the girl of his dreams fucked him for hours and then told him she loved him, didn't wonder if it was true.

However, I am not another man. I let myself get hung up on these things. I let myself obsess over whether Katniss would still be with me if I hadn't had my dick replaced. And her telling me how much she loves sex with me, how much she loves feeling me thrusting inside of her, how much she loves my cock, only plays into those insecurities. Katniss knows this, so she doesn't say things like that.

Well, tries not to.

I'm so lost in thought that I don't see what Katniss is doing until she's above me, straddling my stomach again. She leans down and gives me a surprisingly tender kiss. "I do, you know. I do love you."

And as she slides herself onto me for the third time tonight, I try to believe her.

…..

The night we got back, the nightmares started. I didn't sleep more than an hour or two before I woke up screaming. It was just as well that my family declined to more to Victor's Village with me; they probably would have kicked me out so they could sleep.

At our events the next day, I could tell that Katniss hadn't fared much better. Makeup made her face look perfect, but it couldn't hide the haunted look in her eyes.

My second night wasn't any better. If anything it was worse, as I kept myself awake for hours fearing what was to come, then had my nightmares and screamed myself awake anyway. After that, I decided to bake rather than risk sleeping anymore, and brought boxes of rolls and cookies and cakes over to the Everdeens just after sunrise. Katniss was already awake to answer the door.

The next night, I was just taking out the flour at three in the morning when a knock on the door stopped me. It didn't take a lot of thought to figure out who it might be, but Katniss still took me by surprise when she threw herself into my arms the moment the door opened.

"Peeta!" she cried out. I could see the tears covering her cheeks for just a moment before her face was buried against my bare chest. "You- We- He- You- I-"

I pulled her inside and shut the door. "Shhh, it's okay, Katniss. You're okay. You're safe."

"I'm not worried about me!" she tried to say, though between her sobs and the way her face was pressed against me it was hard to understand her. I picked her up and carried her into a sitting room, seating her across my lap on one of the couches. She didn't move her arms from around my neck or her head from its place on my chest.

Her speech was unsteady as she tried to continue. "W-we were in front of the C-Cornucopia, and you were fighting Cato, and somehow I couldn't help you. Then C-Cato got you in a headlock, and he, he, he th-threw you, threw you-"

"Katniss, shhh, I'm fine, I'm right here." I kept one arm secure around her as I stroked her hair with my other hand. It was obvious what Cato did in her dream. It wasn't so very different from my dreams, really.

"I just, I needed to come see you. I needed to make sure."

"I know, Katniss, it's okay. I get it."

For the first time, she pulled back enough to look at me. "You do?"

I did my best to smile, but I was sure it wasn't very convincing. "Do you think my dreams are any different?"

She stared at me wide-eyed for just a moment before she leaned up and brought our lips together. It took me by surprise; despite what had happened that night on the train we still hadn't exchanged much affection off-camera. It had been eating at me, making me consider and reconsider what Katniss told me about her conversation with Haymitch. What was for show? What was real? What was natural? What was coached?

But when her tongue started licking my lips, begging for entry, I stopped caring. I kissed her with everything I had, I kissed her until I couldn't breath and then kissed her more anyway. And when she moaned, "Make me forget, Peeta," I didn't let myself wonder if she only wanted me as a coping mechanism. And when she pulled my rapidly hardening prosthedick out of my pants, I didn't let myself think about whether she was more interested in me or it. And when she let me pull off her nightgown, I couldn't think about anything except how magnificent she looked. And the first time I thrust into her, I thought that whatever fucked-up circumstances had lead us here, it was worth it.

The following morning, we were woken by the sun streaming in through the front window. We were still on the couch, still wrapped around each other, still naked. Katniss looked away shyly when she realized our position; it was amazing to me that she could still be shy like that after the way she had acted the night before.

I didn't know what to say about our amorous activities, so I said the first thing that came to mind. "No nightmares."

She looked back to me in confusion. "What?"

"You didn't have any nightmares last night."

She seemed to think about it for a moment. "No. Not after… Well, not after I came over here. Did you?"

I shook my head. "No."

Neither of us knew what to say then. Katniss broke the silence. "I better get home before my mother wakes up."

I helped her find her nightgown, and threw my sleep pants back on. When I walked her to the door, she turned and kissed me again. "Can I come back tonight?"

My mind still wasn't quite awake yet. "Tonight?" I asked stupidly.

She blushed a bit, and looked away. "That was the first time I've really slept since the night we spent together on the train," she said. "I don't want to face them alone anymore."

I pulled her into an embrace, which she returned hungrily. "I'll be here. You can come over anytime you want, Katniss."

It was a week later that Mrs. Everdeen realized that Katniss was sneaking out at night and forbade it. Katniss grabbed some clothes and moved into my house that afternoon.

We've never slept apart since.

…..

We leave for the Victory Tour today. Katniss and I were up most of the night, alternately fucking to exhaustion and waiting in vain for sleep to come. I don't anticipate getting much sleep on the Tour.

I baked all of Katniss's favorites for breakfast, and she joined me since she wasn't sleeping anyway. Our prep teams aren't arriving until noon, and we're hoarding every moment of peace before then. Katniss loves when I cook for her, and the sounds she makes while eating are almost as hot as the sounds she makes while fucking. If it wasn't for how often we have sex I'd almost think she's only with me for my baking skills.

I might feel better about that.

I find myself in a melancholy mood, and it's not just because of the impending tour. More and more lately, I find myself thinking of our relationship. Questioning our relationship.

I don't know why I'm thinking this way. I survived the Hunger Games. I finally have the girl of my dreams, and she's insatiable. I should be deliriously happy.

I know exactly why I'm thinking this way. The girl of my dreams didn't fall for me, she fell for my prosthedick. She fell for a piece of equipment that the Capitol installed on me.

This is the conflict that consumes my thoughts. This is what haunts me when I can't sleep at night and spend hours watching the faces Katniss makes in her sleep. This is what distracts me when I'm supposed to be finishing my paintings but instead find I've stood motionless in front of a canvas long enough for the paint to dry on the brush. This is what creeps into my mind even as I'm buried to the hilt inside Katniss.

Finally, just this once, it all becomes too much, and I let my façade fall. I let my worries take control, and I ask in a quiet voice, "Katniss, this is real, isn't it? I mean, you don't love me just for my prosthetic dick, right?"

Katniss puts down what's left of her third cheese bun and looks at me. For one horrible moment, she looks like she's actually considering it. But then she very decisively says, "No. This would have happened anyway."

Just then there's a knock on the door. Katniss and I look at each other. The prep teams and Effie won't be here for another hour. Haymitch would just walk in. Her family wasn't coming over until later, they couldn't see us while the prep teams were working anyway.

As I go to answer the door, I'm not thinking about who it might be. Instead, I turn Katniss's answer over in my head. That we would have happened anyway. That we would have always ended up together, because that's where we belong. Even if I had a fake arm, or a fake leg, instead of a fake cock.

I sigh as I turn the knob to open the door. I really have no choice but to try to believe her.

...

_Alternate title for this story that I didnt use because I liked maintaining the mystery in the first section: The Elephant Cock in the Room_


End file.
